diversity

Our national parks, national forests, and other public lands belong to all Americans — and Americans of all kinds are doing great work to protect these natural treasures for future generations. The Wilderness Society’s Diversity Task Force honors this citizen richness by selecting dedicated Americans to put on the “Faces of Conservation” wall in our Washington, D.C., headquarters.

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African-American participation in the armed forces dates back to the Revolutionary War. During the Civil War over 180,000 black men fought for the Union Army in volunteer regiments. The stirring movie “Glory,” starring Morgan Freeman, dealt with that period.

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In a recent bout of Googling, I fortuitously found the wonderful Web site and blog, Outdoor Afro. Outdoor Afro is a “website community that reconnects African-Americans with natural spaces and one another through recreational activities.” The owner and operator of the website, Rue Mapp, sat down (virtually, of course) and talked to me about the passion behind Outdoor Afro and why conservation organizations should play a role in encouraging people of color to get outside and care about our wild places.

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Of the 50 states, South Carolina is not one often associated with land preservation. But that’s not the case this fall. A bill passed by Congress in October has granted part of the funding to expand the state’s only national park and the home of the nation’s largest tract of old-growth bottomland hardwood forest.

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Our own Frank Peterman had a hand in helping documentary maker Ken Burns find one of the interesting characters portrayed in Burns’ much-anticipated series on national parks (The National Parks: America’s Best Idea), to begin airing on PBS on Sept. 27.